PRO BASKETBALL

PRO BASKETBALL; Jazz Players Are Different, But the System Still Works

By LEE JENKINS

Published: December 17, 2003

Eighteen years after John Stockton and Karl Malone started perfecting their pick and roll, the Utah Jazz has finally proved it is more than just a two-man team.

The worst summer in Utah has given way to perhaps the sweetest surprise of this season. It took the departure of the best players in franchise history for the Jazz to discover the strength of a system it quietly built during the era of Stockton and Malone.

With Stockton retiring and Malone signing with the Lakers, Utah was forced to search for new stars for the first time in almost two decades. The Jazz found them sitting right on the bench, having learned from Stockton how to see the court and from Malone how to slash to the basket.

When Utah enters Continental Arena tonight, the Jazz could show the Nets a thing or two about team play. Working the shot clock on almost every possession and refusing to settle for contested shots, five Utah players average double figures in scoring for a squad that was 13-11 after last night's 91-87 loss to Washington.

The record might not sound like much compared with the days when the Jazz challenged for the N.B.A. championship, but for Kevin O'Connor, senior vice president for basketball operations, this season could be equally rewarding. At some points over the summer, O'Connor heard the Jazz was projected to win only eight games this season and be one of the worst teams in N.B.A. history.

''We heard a lot of things,'' O'Connor said, ''but we did not want to rebuild. We use the word remodeling. We felt the model John and Karl had forged for us was something we wanted to duplicate in a different way.''

Scott Layden, the general manager who spent 18 years with the Jazz before leaving for the Knicks in 1999, taught O'Connor to develop character profiles on players and concentrate on those who ''come to work every day, play hard, share the ball and believe the most important thing is winning, because if you do that, you'll win more than people think you will.''

Even when Stockton and Malone were running the show, Layden bolstered the Jazz with players like Bryon Russell and Shandon Anderson. He has brought some of his former players to the Knicks, but he has not been able to apply his old blueprint. While the Knicks and the Nets are struggling in the anemic Atlantic Division, the Jazz is one of seven teams within two and a half games of first place in the Midwest, another signal of the Western Conference's relative strength.

In many ways, Utah is unique in the N.B.A. because the system transcends the talent. Like a major college basketball program, the Jazz does not necessarily pursue only the best players available but the players who best fit into the structure of the team and the area. After arguably losing the top point guard and the best power forward of their generation, Utah's biggest free-agent acquisition was Raja Bell, who is averaging 10 points a game.

''Every time you play the Jazz, you know they'll play hard,'' Nets forward Brian Scalabrine said. ''They lost two megastars, but those other guys have proven they can play, too. It's the opposite of a team with a lot of individual talent that is always going out on its own. The players there have bought into their system and they execute it and get good shots.''

With Layden's departure, O'Connor is one of many little-known figures helping Utah come back from a period dominated by a star system. Initially, the Jazz wanted to go after budding free agents in the off-season. Instead, Utah mostly banked on players the organization was already developing. As a result, Matt Harpring and Andrei Kirilenko are each scoring more than 16 points a game, shooting about 48 percent from the field and averaging about 8 rebounds.

Breakthroughs from Harpring and Kirilenko might have been expected. But no one could have anticipated the emergence of Carlos Arroyo, a Puerto Rican point guard who went to Florida International and was waived two seasons ago by Toronto and Denver. Arroyo had never scored more than 4 points a game in the N.B.A., but after studying under Stockton last season, he is averaging 14 points and 6 assists this season. And DeShawn Stevenson, who never averaged more than 5 points a game since leaving high school in 2000, is scoring 11 points a game.

Much of the credit is going to Coach Jerry Sloan, who used to be criticized for failing to relate to young players and who is now being praised for the opposite reason. With the longest tenure of any coach in the N.B.A., Sloan is showing that consistency on the bench yields consistency on the court. But the Jazz is also being noticed for finding players other teams either did not discover or did not want.

''The biggest kick I get is watching our young players have success for the right reasons,'' O'Connor said. ''You have to move on every year and be businesslike and say, 'Karl will wear another uniform, and John won't play anymore, and how do we still put the best team on the court?' ''

There were times during the summer when O'Connor walked into the Delta Center and asked himself that very question. He wondered how the place would look without Stockton and Malone. Turns out, the Jazz does not appear all that different.

Photos: The sixth-year forward Matt Harpring is having a breakthrough season for the Jazz. (Photo by Associated Press); Jerry Sloan has learned how to relate to Utah's young players this season. (Photo by Associated Press)